环境税的双赢效应

环境税是近几年来社会关注的焦点问题,在阐述环境税双赢效应产生的基础上,论证了环境税实施为有关国家带来的环境和非环境效益,并针对我国现行税制结构和污染收费情况,分析了我国出现双赢效应的局限与可能,进而给出创造中国式环境税双赢效应的建议。     

中国能源利用效率区域差异基尼系数分析

基尼系数是经济学中对贫富差距量化评价的重要工具.文章从基尼系数的经济学内涵出发,将基尼系数的概念和意义应用于地区能源利用效率分析.以全国各地区的能源消耗分配为例,应用基尼系数法分析了地区总体经济发展水平,地区工业化程度,地区经济重型化程度对能源消费强度分配公平性的影响,并提出了以绿色贡献系数作为判断不公平因子的依据.绘制各影响因素的洛伦茨曲线,计算出中国2006年的能源消耗基尼系数,根据基尼系数和绿色贡献系数对能源消费强度地区差异进行量化分析,最后得出合理的结论.     

税收

一些国家在日益深入地探讨征收环境税的想法。其中谈论最多的是可能对二氧化碳（人们认为可能引起全球变暖的“温室”气体之一）排放征收碳税的设想。芬 兰 从1990年1月起,芬兰根据化石燃料的碳含量对其征税。税率是每排放1吨碳征收6.10美元。法 国 国务秘书批准了一项法令,把对SO_2排     

实施能源管理的政策与战略： 对喀麦隆环境保护的影响

虽然在工业化国家里,酸雨、温室效应和其它与使用能源有关的危害早已成为谈论环境时的热门话题,而森林毁坏及沙漠化业已表明,第三世界,特别是撒哈拉以南的非洲,也被卷了进来。 作为撒赫勒半荒漠生态系统和热带雨林的交汇区,喀麦隆的地理状况、木柴占68.5％的最终能源平衡以及占石油制品消费量和CO/CO_2排放量71.5％的运输行业,所有这些因素结合在一起,将这个国家带入能源与环境关系的论战中心。     

图书与报告——能源

接通：旅游业的可再生能源机遇，能源、国家和市场：1979年以来的英国能源政策     

能源在可持续发展中的作用：拉丁美洲能源政策分析的要素

与能源政策和可持续发展之间的关系有关的决策的制定应该不仅包括对当前问题的鉴定和对未来影响的评估，而且为了增加这些政策成功的可能性还包括有关各方面的积极参与，因为一切环境政策都有着非常复杂的环境内涵，仅仅采用有限的技术手段或系统的运作可能很难找到合适的解决方案。     

建筑环境的生命周期分析

生命周期思想是解决环境与社会问题的一种整体性方法，这种方法是可持续建筑概念的关键，LCA（生命周期分析，或者生命周期评价）是将生命周期思想应用于建筑和建造业的一种重要工具，LCA可以提供有关物质和能源流动的重要信息，由于它很难应用于建筑物本身，所以关注的焦点越来越集中在对建筑环境实施更全面的分析上，通过LCA获得的知识最好是作为综合设计方法的一部分进行应用，在大多数项目中，如果不把LCA与数量调查或者能源模拟等其他手段综合起来就无法获得完整的LCA，将LCA应用于政策制定的需要优先考虑的问题依地区和经济条件而有所不同。     

辽宁省能源足迹变动的分析

采用生态足迹模型与分解分析模型,定量核算了1990-2006年辽宁省能源足迹,分析了其变动趋势及其影响因素.结果表明,1990-2006年,辽宁省能源足迹呈不断增大趋势,总量由3508万hm~2增加到6491万hm~2,人均值则由0.896hm~2扩大到1.542 hm~2,增加了将近1倍,在区域生态压力中的贡献额为30%.在各类贡献因素中,经济发展对能源足迹的贡献远高于其他因素,其次为能源结构效应、人口规模效应,能源强度效应最低.虽然能源强度不断下降,但其对区域生态压力下降的贡献不足于抵消由能源结构不合理和消费水平的提高造成的生态影响,导致辽宁省能源足迹持续增加.     

农户能源利用方式的选择与农村环境的变化:某贫困山村薪炭林利用案例研究

为了深入了解农户能源利用状况与农村环境的相互作用关系,对一个贫困山村进行了为期15天的实地考察。通过问卷调查,入户访谈等方式,收集了50余份问卷和大量原始数据、图片资料,发现当地农户在利用薪材能源作为燃料直接燃烧时并不会带来对当地森林资源的破坏,但能源利用效率不高;而在用薪材能源作为香菇培养基原料时显著地提高了能源利用效率,却也严重影响了当地森林资源的可持续利用。由此可见,能源利用方式的选择与农村环境的变化息息相关。为了保证农村能源的可持续利用,人们需要同时考虑农村环境的承载能力,这就决定了改善农户能源利用状况不能单纯以提高能源利用效率为目标。在结合当地客观条件,综合当地政府、当地农户的意见的基础上,提出了当地能源利用的最佳方向应该是:在不增加农民支出前提下,鼓励农民改善薪材能源的利用方式,力图达到提高能源利用效率和森林资源可持续利用的“双赢”目的。     

环境税的倍加红利效应及CGE模型对其的支持

归纳分析了环境税"倍加红利"效应的主要观点,通过推介国外应用可计算一般均衡模型(CGE)分析环境税倍加红利效用的经验,提出了在我国开征环境税和应用CGE模型对其进行分析的构想,以期为寻求环境税在我国的开征提供理论和实践依据。     

An uncertain energy planning model under carbon taxes

In this study, an interval fuzzy mixed-integer energy planning model (IFMI-EPM) is developed under considering the carbon tax policy. The developed IFMIEPM incorporates techniques of interval-parameter programming, fuzzy planning and mixed-integer programming within a general energy planning model. The IFMIEPM can not only be used for quantitatively analyzing a variety of policy scenarios that are associated with different levels of carbon tax policy, but also tackle uncertainties expressed as discrete intervals and fuzzy sets in energy and environment systems. Considering low, medium and high carbon tax rates, the model is applied to an ideal energy and environment system. The results indicate that reasonable solutions have been generated. They can be used for generating decision alternatives and thus help decision makers identify desired carbon tax policy.     

Jobs and climate policy: Evidence from British Columbia's revenue-neutral carbon tax

This paper examines the employment impact of British Columbia's revenue-neutral carbon tax implemented in 2008. While all industries appear to benefit from the redistributed tax revenues, the most carbon-intensive and trade-sensitive industries see employment fall with the tax, while clean service industries see employment rise. By aggregating across industries I find the BC carbon tax generated, on average, a small but statistically significant 0.74 percent annual increases in employment over the 2007–2013 period. This paper provides initial evidence showing how a revenue-neutral carbon tax may not adversely affect employment.     

Announcing climate policy: Can a green paradox arise without scarcity?

Unintended consequences of a pre-announced climate policy are studied within a framework that allows for competition between polluting and clean energy sources. We show that early announcement of a carbon tax gives rise to a “green-paradox,” in that it increases emissions in the interim period (between announcement and actual implementation), irrespective of the scarcity of fossil fuels. The paradoxical outcome is driven by consumption-saving tradeoffs facing households who seek to smooth consumption over time and holds both when the announced implementation date is taken as a credible threat and when households are skeptical about the (political) will or capability of the government to implement the policy as announced.     

Tax evasion and optimal environmental taxes

This paper introduces a new argument to the debate about the role of environmental taxes in modern tax systems. Some environmental taxes, particularly taxes on gasoline or electricity, are more difficult to evade than taxes on labor or income. When the tax base is shifted in a revenue-neutral manner toward these environmental taxes, the result is a net reduction in the amount of tax evasion. Using a carbon tax as a motivating example, the “tax evasion effect” is shown to sharply reduce the welfare cost of controlling emissions. A simple computable general equilibrium model suggests that the impact of considering tax evasion can be large: costs are lowered by 28% in the United States, by 89% in China, and by 97% in India. In countries with high levels of pre-existing tax evasion, a carbon tax will pay for itself through improvements in the efficiency of the tax system.     

Optimal policy instruments for externality-producing durable goods under present bias

When consumers exhibit present bias, the standard solution to market failures caused by externalities—Pigouvian pricing—is suboptimal. I investigate policies aimed at externalities for present-biased consumers. Optimal policy includes an instrument to correct the externality and an instrument to correct the present bias. Either instrument can be an incentive-based policy (e.g. a tax on fuel economy) or a command-and-control policy (e.g. a fuel economy mandate). Under consumer heterogeneity, a command-and-control policy may dominate an incentive-based policy. Calibrated to the US automobile market, simulation results suggest that the second-best gasoline tax is 3–30% higher than marginal external damages. The optimal price policy includes a gasoline tax set about equal to marginal external damages and a fuel economy tax that increases the price of an average non-hybrid car by about $550–$2200 relative to the price of an average hybrid car.     

Market equilibrium and welfare effects of a fuel tax in China: The impact of consumers' response through driving patterns

We investigate the market equilibrium and welfare effects of a fuel tax in China relative to an alternative policy instrument that rations the number of new automobile sales through auctioned quotas. Unlike those of previous studies, our modeling approach incorporates both household car purchase and utilization decisions, the latter of which have been ignored in previous studies on China's fuel tax. Ignoring this margin of choice will underestimate the fuel tax's ability to mitigate externalities. Using detailed household-level panel data and a fixed effects econometric specification, we estimate the fuel price elasticity of vehicle miles traveled is −0.59 on average. The results of the counterfactual analysis suggest that a 51% increase in tax-inclusive gasoline prices will reduce car sales by 24.9% but increase social welfare to a degree that depends on vehicles' lifetime. We find that compared to auctioned quotas, the fuel tax results in greater car sales but higher social welfare.     

Is Chinese trade policy motivated by environmental concerns?

This paper analyses whether China's export VAT rebates and export taxes are driven by environmental concerns. Since China struggles to enforce environmental regulation, trade policy can be used as a second-best environmental policy. In a general equilibrium model it is possible to show that the second-best export tax increases in a product's pollution intensity. The empirical analysis investigates whether the export tax equivalent of partial VAT rebates and export taxes are higher for products which are more pollution intensive along several dimensions. The results indicate that the VAT rebate rates are set in a way that discourages exports of water pollution intensive, SO₂ intensive and energy intensive products from 2007 on. Moreover, the conservation of natural resources such as minerals, metals, wood products and precious stones seems to be a key determinant of China's export VAT rebate rates. There is little evidence that export taxes are motivated by environmental concerns.     

An assessment of China-Japan-Korea Free Trade Agreement’s economic and environmental impacts on China

Recently, China, Japan, and the Republic of Korea (Korea) are conducting a government-commissioned feasibility study on the Free Trade Agreement among the three countries (CJKFTA) to form a regional free trade zone in East Asia. Considering that freer trade can cause unexpected impact on domestic environment, there is a need to evaluate the environmental impact of such a trade policy. This move should be made to help negotiators understand and pay more attention to environmental issues during CJKFTA negotiations, and to help lobby with the government to carry out appropriate policy instruments for adaptation or mitigation. Following the Chain Reaction Assessment Method that integrates and links the elements of trade, production, and environment, the present research aims to quantitatively assess CJKFTA’s possible impact on China’s environment. This is done by estimating the variations of China’s major conventional pollutants and greenhouse gases (GHGs) emission in two policy scenarios to represent CJKFTA’s scale and composition effects on China’s environment. Estimating the variations is based on a static Computable General Equilibrium model, working with Global Trade Analysis Project (GTAP) 7 database and China’s energy-environment statistics. Based on these assessments, CJKFTA is predicted to lead to notable environmental impact, including increased emissions of agricultural total nitrogen, agricultural total phosphorus, chemical oxygen demand, and GHGs. On the other hand, decreased emissions of industrial SO₂ and dust are also expected to happen. Suitable policies need to be made to combat negative effects and amplify positive ones, while aiming at a more sustainable regional freer trade system.     

Estimates from a consumer demand system: implications for the incidence of environmental taxes

Most studies suggest that environmental taxes are regressive, making them less attractive policy options. We consider the distributional effects of a gasoline tax increase using four incidence measures and under three scenarios for gas tax revenue use. To incorporate behavioral responses we use Consumer Expenditure Survey data to estimate a consumer demand system that includes gasoline, other goods, and leisure. Our estimates confirm that when revenues are not recycled, a gasoline tax is regressive. Use of incidence measures that ignore demand responses, however, will substantially overstate this regressivity. In contrast, the differences between the equivalent variation and easier-to-implement consumer surplus measures are relatively small. In addition, our results suggest that using the additional gas tax revenue to fund labor tax cuts makes the policy substantially less regressive while using the revenue to fund lump-sum transfers actually makes it progressive.     

Strategic pollution control and capital tax competition

In an analytical model of symmetric countries with mobile capital and local or transboundary pollution we investigate whether competition in emissions taxes (or emissions caps) and capital taxes leads to efficient outcomes when governments act strategically. When they have capital taxes and emissions caps at their disposal, they refrain from taxing capital and set their caps inefficiently lax [efficient] for transboundary [local] pollution. When they have the option to tax capital and emissions, capital is subsidized [untaxed] and emissions taxes are inefficiently low [efficient] for transboundary [local] pollution. In case of transboundary pollution emissions caps are Pareto-superior to emissions taxes. That holds regardless of whether the environmental policy is applied as stand-alone policy or combined with capital tax competition.